Rush to help airlines, travelers could crack open budget door

By David Lawder and Doug Palmer

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Congress got rid of a headache on Friday when it rescued the flying public from flight delays caused by its budget cutting. But in the view of many lawmakers, the pain is just about to begin.

Members of Congress and groups representing people hit by across-the-board budget cuts, ranging from cancer patients to welfare recipients, say the quick action on air traffic control staffing underscored the importance of being visible to millions of Americans.

"What are we going to do, every time there's a fire we're going to put it out by moving some funds around? That's a shell game," said Representative Gerald Connolly, a Democrat from northern Virginia.

"I'm going to predict that there's going to be more weeping and gnashing of teeth, as sequestration sets in and we're going to continue to approach this on a piecemeal basis," he said.

Next in line for individual funding relief will be advocates for national parks, low-income housing, AIDS funding, meals on wheels and Community Development Block Grants, Connolly said, adding that budget cuts for these and other safety-net services will be felt severely by local communities.

Representatives for some of these other programs said it was the television images of lines in airports and the interviews with angry passengers that led to action, combined with the lobbying power of the travel industry.

"It means we worry about who's going to scream the loudest now," said Chris Hansen, president of the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network, which has been lobbying against cuts in federal funding of medical research.

A heavy dose of lobbying from the airline and travel industry preceded the legislation enacted Friday, which permitted the Federal Aviation Administration to move money to avoid the furloughs of air traffic controllers that were causing the delays.

Sequestration - the $109 billion in automatic across-the-board budget cuts enacted by Congress and signed by President Barack Obama - formally took effect in March and barring Congressional action to replace it may continue for a decade.

Some programs won relief from Congress in March, notably the meat and poultry industry, which fought successfully to prevent furloughs of U.S. Department of Agriculture meat inspectors.

But because the furloughs in other programs, such as the FAA, were not immediately implemented, the impact was slow to build.

TRAVEL LOBBY

The travel industry began to accelerate its lobbying effort after it learned early last week from the FAA that as many as 6,700 flights per day could be delayed, potentially reducing capacity at major airports by 30 to 40 percent.

Nicholas Calio, president of Airlines for America, or A4A, the main airlines industry group, worked the phones throughout the week, said Jean Medina, senior vice president for communications at A4A.

"He certainly was in very close contact with a lot of people to make sure they understood what needed to happen," she said.

Its first course of action was to ask the administration for a 30-day delay.

When that was denied, the industry group began focusing on a legislative fix that would clear both houses with bipartisan support and be signed into law by Obama.

US Airways Chief Executive Doug Parker, who would head the world's largest airline if his carrier's merger with AMR Corp's American Airlines is approved, said he spent the past week making calls to government officials in his airline's hub markets to express concern about the furloughs.

"What I know is we're doing great disservice to the flying public and to the citizens of the United States and we need for this to get resolved," Parker told Reuters from Arizona earlier this week.

The non-profit U.S. Travel Association said it mounted its own "sequester offensive" in response to the furloughs and began a consumer texting campaign that connected travelers who had been delayed at airports to members of Congress.

The association also asked industry workers to contact their representatives in Congress to explain that the travel delays put their jobs at risk.

"We were in frequent contact with Congress urging them to solve this problem as soon as possible," Erik Hansen, director of domestic policy at the U.S. Travel Association, said on Friday. "We were able to generate hundreds of calls and emails to Congress and we're hoping that helped to move the ball forward," Hansen said.

VISIBILITY

Airlines for America reported about $6.3 million in lobbying expenses in 2012 according to the Center for Responsive Politics; the U.S. Travel Association spent about $1.7 million; US Airways and Delta about $2.8 million each.

While other interest groups have a lobbying presence in the national capital, they are hard pressed to match the visibility of air travel.

Compared to "longer lines at airports," said Cynthia Pellegrini, a vice president at the March of Dimes, which raises funds to improve the health of mothers and babies, "you can't see that a child's belly is emptier because her family couldn't get food assistance."

"We are not as well-heeled as the travel industry," said Deborah Weinstein, executive director of the Coalition on Human Needs, an alliance of social welfare organizations. "But I think as more people learn of this appalling choice," that Congress made on Friday, "they will get as mad as I am."

Senator Amy Klobuchar, a Democrat from Minnesota, home to a major Delta Air Lines hub in Minneapolis, was among the members backing an FAA budget fix on Thursday when the Senate passed it.

She called it a "practical, pragmatic answer to an immediate problem," but acknowledged that it does nothing to get Congress closer to fixing the problems caused by sequestration. More effects of the cuts, demonstrated dramatically to the public, could do that, she added.

She may not have long to wait. Organizations that have been more quietly protesting the budget cuts were rethinking their strategy on Friday in the wake of Congress' action.

"It is inexplicable why proven and effective Meals on Wheels programs get overlooked from exemption from the sequester when both the business and social case exists," said Ellie Hollander, President and CEO of Meals on Wheels Association of America.

"I guess that's because we need to be a different kind of squeaky wheel."

(Additional reporting by Karen Jacobs, Susan Heavy and Karey Van Hall; Editing by Fred Barbash and Tim Dobbyn)

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Budget cuts back in spotlight as flight delays mount

By Mark Felsenthal and Alwyn Scott

WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) - The Obama administration on Wednesday backed a plan that would temporarily eliminate spending cuts disrupting U.S. air travel, while lawmakers in Washington scrambled to avoid blame as the impact of the reductions began being felt across the country.

Airlines pushed for the government to act as flight delays increased and planes stacked up at airports, with one chief executive saying, "We can't do this for long."

With Republicans and conservative commentators blaming President Barack Obama for using the across-the-board spending cuts known as sequestration to score political points, the White House said it supported Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's proposal to replace the reductions by claiming savings from the drawdown of war spending.

"We support this effort to allow both sides to find a longer-term solution that replaces the sequester permanently in a balanced way so we can stop these harmful cuts that are hurting our economy and middle-class families across the country," White House spokesman Jay Carney told a briefing.

The administration would support the move as a temporary measure even though it does not raise revenues, Carney said.

Congressional Republicans have rejected the proposal, saying counting war savings is an accounting gimmick, but complaints about the air traffic delays have thrust sequestration back into the spotlight.

EFFECTS ADDING UP

Thousands of flights have been held on the ground, some for as long as two hours, since the Federal Aviation Administration began furloughing air-traffic controllers on Sunday. The intermittent delays have slowed travel at major hubs like Chicago, New York, Los Angeles and Atlanta, caused flight cancellations and stirred concern a chunk of the nation's economy could suffer if the situation persists or worsens.

For business travelers and tourists, the slowdown means missed connections and meetings. Private planes used by businesses are waiting while controllers first guide commercial flights into hubs, and they are carrying more fuel as a safety precaution, in case they are held in the air.

US Airways, Delta Air Lines, American Airlines and Southwest Airlines have warned that furloughs could cost hundreds of millions of dollars a year in lost revenue. The airline industry says it helps generate more than $1 trillion in economic activity in the United States annually and supports 10 million jobs.

"We can't do this for long without having major disruption to the flying public," US Airways CEO Doug Parker said in an interview. He said he called government officials at the airline's hubs last week, and that Congress and the Obama administration were trying to limit the damage.

The requirements have put pressure on FAA chief Michael Huerta, who was questioned in congressional hearings in the past two weeks about furloughs and the closures of smaller towers.

Huerta says the cuts are the only way to trim the agency's budget, and he said on Wednesday that flight delays had not been as bad as feared.

But industry critics said the FAA had not been forthcoming with information. "We didn't get a detailed briefing until Tuesday - a week ago Tuesday," said Jean Medina, a spokeswoman for the trade organization Airlines for America, or A4A.

Last Friday, A4A sought to block the furloughs in court, and the Air Line Pilots Association joined the A4A in launching a website that directs visitors to email or call congressional members on the issue. The ALPA represents nearly 53,000 pilots at airlines in the United States and Canada.

More than 12,000 people have used it to voice concerns since it went live on Friday. A map showing congressional districts shows large pockets of opposition in Chicago, the Northeast and California. Most of those posting comments oppose furloughs.

CONGRESS LASHES OUT

"These cuts simply punish everyone rather than specifically target the great number of outdated, wasteful and duplicative functions being funded with our taxpayer dollars," Iowa Republican Tom Latham said. "In short, arbitrary, non-targeted, across-the-board cuts are no way to run a government."

Members of Congress are offering a measure that would allow the FAA to transfer funds between accounts to minimize disruptions to air travel.

The sequestration cuts are the legacy of Republican efforts to pressure the Obama administration into spending cuts in exchange for raising the nation's debt limit. The White House and lawmakers agreed to hold up the threat of the reductions, which affect defense and non-defense spending equally, as incentive to reach a broader deficit-reduction deal.

When that deal never materialized, the cuts took effect on March 1. Although the administration broadly advertised the negative impact they would have, those effects were not evident right away.

Flight delays this week have revived the issue. Carney blamed Republicans on Wednesday for underestimating the negative impact of the spending reductions.

"Republicans in Congress made a political tactical decision to embrace the sequester," he said. Cuts proposed by House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan would bite even more deeply than those under the sequester, he added.

But some Republican conservatives expressed support for the sequestration cuts on Wednesday, saying that they were long overdue.

"I don't understand this fascination with the Democrats right now with the sequester, and frankly some Republicans as well," Republican Representative Raul Labrador said.

(Additional reporting by Karen Jacobs in Scottsdale, Arizona; Editing by Ben Berkowitz, Mary Milliken and Peter Cooney)

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Interactive: What's in Obama's 2014 Budget Proposal

By Chris Wilson

The budget proposal that President Barack Obama unveiled Wednesday includes a highly controversial measure that would curtail increases in many Social Security and Medicare payments over time. While the document is merely a "symbolic, nonbinding spending blueprint," as Yahoo News’ Olivier Knox wrote yesterday, it quickly exposed fracture lines among Democrats over the future of the entitlement programs.

Ballooning entitlement payments are the most visible aspect of a pressing budgetary concern: Every year, the government has less immediate control over how much money it spends. Of the $3.77 trillion in Obama’s fiscal year 2014 budget, $2.31 trillion of it is “mandatory” spending required by law. Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid make up the bulk of that spending, but there are all sorts of other things in there, as well: disaster relief funds, highway aid, nutritional programs and so forth. Only $1.2 trillion goes to “discretionary” spending, which consists of most agency funding. Half of that is related to defense.

The following infographic arranges Obama’s budget in three rings. The innermost ring shows the entire budget divided by how much is mandatory versus discretionary, plus a third category for interest payments on the national debt. As you move outward, you see those categories subdivided by agency and then by program. Mouse over a slice to see the exact value.

Because this is highly granular data that the White House provides as supplementary material to its budget, the totals in the graphic will be a bit higher than in the summary figures in most news reports. This is often because some agencies produce small amounts of revenue to offset costs, such as leasing federal land. Those negative values are difficult to represent in physical space on the screen.

Source: Public Budget Database (FY 2014 Budget Authority)

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Alabama Education Budget Prevents Future Misappropriation of Funds from Reading/Math Initiatives to Common Core

TUSCALOOSA, Ala., April 11, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ --  The Alabama House amended the education budget Wednesday to prevent the Superintendent of Education from diverting millions of additional dollars from the Alabama Reading and Math Initiatives to implement Common Core.  This was in response to investigations by conservative grassroots groups that revealed Alabama State Superintendent Dr. Tommy Bice had diverted over fifty million dollars from these two initiatives to pay for Common Core.

Elois Zeanah, president of the Alabama Federation of Republican Women, stated, "If Dr. Bice had been in private industry, he would have been fired for diverting millions of dollars to his pet project!  These are tax dollars of hard-working Alabamians and should be treated no differently by legislators than how CEOs treat dollars from private investors or for-profit companies." 

Zeanah continued, "We are excited about the amendment that was passed to prevent future misappropriations.  Our children have lost at least one year of the reading instruction that had made Alabama number one in reading gains in the nation and decreased the reading gap between black and white students by four points since 2003.  This unauthorized diversion should anger everyone."

Sharon Sewell, a retired teacher and director of Alabamians for Excellence in Education stated:  "The state board of education seems to think they can do whatever they want without transparency and accountability to parents, teachers, taxpayers, the legislature, or even the governor.  That is my view.  It is very important that parents understand what Common Core is, where it came from, where it is going, and how it will impact their children's lives."

Conservative advocates say Common Core is "one-size-fits-all" national standards and if legislators don't repeal Common Core, they will voluntarily give away Alabama's education freedom under the Tenth Amendment to bureaucrats in Washington, D.C. who care more about power and money than about children and education. 

Sewell who taught school for 32 years added, "Common Core is not a reform as we have known in the past.  It is a total transformation of schools.  The federal government has our healthcare.  They're trying to get our guns.  Now they want our children, too!"

Bills to repeal Common Core (SB 403/404 and HB 565) are expected to be voted on by the Education Policy Committees next week.   

SOURCE Alabama Federation of Republican Women

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Republican senator sees Obama budget offer as positive

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham on Sunday became the first prominent Republican to publicly praise, however lukewarm, the budget proposal the White House outlined last week.

Graham said that while he believes President Barack Obama's plan is overall bad for the economy, "there are nuggets of his budget that I think are optimistic." He was speaking on NBC's "Meet the Press" program.

Graham, a conservative who has deviated from party positions in the past, and has said he would consider raising up to $600 billion in new tax revenue if Democrats accept significant changes to Medicare, the government health program for elderly Americans, and Medicaid, the health safety net for low-income people.

The White House on Friday said the president would propose a budget that would offer cuts to so-called entitlement programs such as Social Security, a retirement program, and Medicare in exchange for increased tax revenues and a commitment to spend money on education and infrastructure repair.

Obama's proposal, which will formally be made public on Wednesday, is a symbolic document, and both the Senate and House of Representatives have already passed their own budget resolutions.

The president's aides have said he hopes to use the offer to appeal to enough middle-of-the-road lawmakers of both parties to pass a broad deal to reduce the budget deficit.

Obama also hopes to reverse the deep spending cuts that automatically kicked in March 1 as a result of the failure of the White House and Congress to reach an agreement on replacing them.

Graham's reception of the president's budget proposal is warmer than fellow Republicans and some of the president's own allies have accorded it so far.

House Speaker John Boehner said last week the president was ignoring Republicans' staunch opposition to any tax hikes. And independent Senator Bernie Sanders, who votes with the Democrats, said he would oppose any efforts to lower payments to Social Security beneficiaries.

But Graham said that the president's offer contained approaches to cutting spending that he supports. One is the proposal to index cost-of-living increases for government program benefits to a less-generous measure of inflation.

"The president is showing a little bit of leg here, this is somewhat encouraging," Graham said. "He has sort of made a step forward in the entitlement-reform process."

Obama has invited 12 Republican senators for dinner on the day of the budget release as part of an effort to soften resistance among the opposition political party.

"The president's focus, in addition to the regular order process that members of Congress say they want, is to try to find a caucus of common sense, folks who are willing to compromise, that don't think compromise is a dirty word, and try to get something done," White House senior advisor Dan Pfeiffer said on ABC News' "This Week with George Stephanopoulos" program.

(Reporting By Aruna Viswanatha and Philip Barbara, writing by Mark Felsenthal)

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Budget cuts ripple beyond defense to travel, tech

By Karen Jacobs

(Reuters) - The rustic, 316-room Cheyenne Mountain Resort hotel in Colorado Springs is usually booked solid this time of year, just days before a major national space conference rolls into town.

But business is off by about a third this season as NASA has withdrawn from the conference, one of many government agencies cutting spending to meet $85 billion in budget cuts that must be made by September 30 known as "sequestration."

"We're still taking reservations," said the Cheyenne Mountain Resort's general manager, Todd Felsen, who has 100 vacant rooms. "Last year at this time, we were over booked."

As the U.S. travel industry nears its summer upswing, airlines and hotels are joining other companies in warning about lost revenue due to federal budget cuts that started in March -- and fear they'll lose much more.

This week, Delta Air Lines and US Airways Group said reduced last-minute bookings by government workers cut their unit revenue in March, sparking a selloff in airline stocks.

Shares of F5 Networks Inc plunged 18 percent on Friday, after the network equipment maker partly blamed lower government sales for its profit warning - news that also pressured shares of rivals Juniper Networks Inc and Cisco Systems Inc.

Last month, Britain's Smiths Group Plc, an engineering concern whose products range from explosive detectors to surgical needles, warned of lower revenue due to U.S. government spending cuts.

The travel industry offers a window into the domino effect of government cutbacks. Federal, state and local governments spent about $30 billion a year on travel in 2011, according to the U.S. Travel Association, and the effect of reduced travel on the movement of goods and people, business meetings, leisure industries and tax revenue is significant. The Federal Aviation Administration estimates that commercial aviation helps generate $1.3 trillion in annual economic activity in the United States.

U.S. budget officials could not say how much federal travel was being cut in the current fiscal year, but historical tallies provide a clue. In fiscal 2012, federal agencies cut travel spending by about $2 billion from fiscal 2010, a budget official told lawmakers in late February.

Recent anecdotal evidence suggests government agencies are scaling back travel even more this year. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration announced last month that it would not attend the National Space Symposium, the annual space conference set for April 8-11 in Colorado Springs. NASA Administrator Charles Bolden, who typically addresses the conference, also will not be attending.

Travel cost-cutting will help save NASA an estimated $10 million in the current fiscal year, the agency said, noting it already trimmed conference and travel spending aggressively in the past. "With sequestration in place, we are further curtailing these types of non-mission critical activities," NASA spokesman Allard Beutel said in an email.

Those cuts ripple through the broader economy. The nonprofit foundation that hosts the space conference estimated government attendance this year was down by about 200 people. The meeting brings millions of dollars to the Colorado Springs economy, and allows the community to showcase its picturesque mountain views.

"This is our Super Bowl," said Felsen, of the Cheyenne Mountain Resort.

AIR TRAVEL CONCERNS

The effects of sequestration come as hotels and airlines are recovering from the 2008-09 downturn. Many U.S. airlines marked their third straight year of profitability in 2012 despite high oil prices. U.S. hotels have posted three years of gains in occupancy and average daily rates after declines in both measures in 2009, according to data from Smith Travel Research.

As the budget tightening continues, the travel industry is growing increasingly concerned that plans to furlough air traffic controllers and trim spending on customs and border patrol will cause long delays at major airports that could keep business and leisure flyers away, and slow cargo shipments.

While those factors have not affected travel so far, some travel agents says customers are voicing fears about flight delays and long security lines at airports this summer.

Julia Jacobo, an executive assistant with Cook Travel in New York, said some customers are hesitant to book international flights, which are most profitable for carriers.

"For now, people are still flying," Jacobo said. "But due to our clients' concerns and hesitation, we are worried about what this will mean for bookings in the future."

Airport officials say it's still unclear what will happen when controller furloughs begin April 21. They warn disruptions are possible, and say travelers should arrive early for flights and be prepared for delays.

At Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, controller furloughs could close one of five runways, which could lead to flight delays or cancellations.

"We're planning for the worst case scenario," said Louis Miller, the airport's general manager. "We're hoping that Congress and the Administration can get something worked out" before the furloughs start.

DC AREA HOTELS TAKE HIT

Hotels had been feeling the effects of reduced government spending even before sequestration took effect. Budget uncertainties led to cancellations of several air shows, including Virginia's Langley air show and the 2013 Wings Over Wayne Open House and Air Show at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base near Goldsboro, North Carolina, both of which had been scheduled for May.

Mark Carrier, president of B.F. Saul Company Hospitality Group, a Bethesda, Maryland-based operator of 20 hotels, said there has been a noticeable drop-off in business since January tied to sequestration. Sixteen of his company's hotels are in the Washington area.

"It's everything from the agencies saying 'we're not going to have meetings or do the training that we planned' to situations where the normal demand just isn't showing up," Carrier said. "It's really a significant thing here regionally."

As government business decreased, spending by defense contractors such as Boeing Co and Northrop Grumman Corp have also dropped off, Carrier said. At B.F. Saul hotels in the Washington region, 20 to 25 percent of business is directly dependent on the federal government, while another 20 to 25 percent is related to contractors, he added.

As a result, B.F. Saul expects a significant drop in hotel revenues this year from 2012, Carrier said. That follows flat revenue the past two years, he said.

"We just have no way to offset the demand change in government and the contractors," Carrier said.

(Reporting by Karen Jacobs; Additional reporting by Susan Heavey and Valerie Volcovici in Washington; Editing by Alwyn Scott, Tiffany Wu and Leslie Gevirtz)

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Obama tries to woo Republicans with cuts in budget

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama will offer cuts to Social Security and other entitlement programs in a budget proposal aimed at swaying Republicans to compromise on a deficit reduction deal to put the country's finances on a sounder footing, a senior administration official said on Friday.

The president will offer to apply a less generous measure of inflation to calculate cost-of-living increases, the official said on condition of anonymity. That change would result in lower payments to some beneficiaries of the Social Security program for retirees.

Obama would agree to cuts to other so-called entitlement programs, the official said.

But the president will only accept these spending cuts if congressional Republicans, for their part, agree to higher taxes, the official added. The president's budget proposal, due to be laid out in full on Wednesday, would cut the deficit by $1.8 trillion over ten years, the aide said.

(Reporting By Mark Felsenthal; Editing by David Brunnstrom)

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Napolitano says new budget may ease border impact

HOUSTON (AP) — Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano says a new congressional budget should ease the need to furlough or cut overtime hours for border agents.

Napolitano said Thursday after meeting with Houston law enforcement officials and business leaders the agency still is reviewing the numbers but it appears security will "get back to where we were before sequestration." Later Thursday, she issued a statement saying the number of border agents should be back to normal with the 2014 fiscal budget.

Napolitano was in Houston discussing immigration reform. She also visited the Texas border town of McAllen. On Friday, she heads to Tucson, Ariz.

The National ICE Council, which represents some 7,600 Immigration and Customs Enforcement staff, criticized Napolitano for not discussing reforms with them.

Congress hopes to tackle immigration reform this month.

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Lawmakers tighten belts amid automatic budget cuts

WASHINGTON (AP) — Members of Congress are traveling less and worrying more about meeting office salaries. Their aides are contending with long lines to get inside their offices and fewer prospects of a raise. Such are the indignities thrust upon the men and women who brought the country $85 billion in government spending cuts this month.

There probably won't be much sympathy for a senator or congressman making $174,000 a year who is in no danger of being furloughed or laid off, at least until the next election. Still, there has been an effort, especially in the Republican-led House, to show that no one should be exempt from sacrifice.

"As those who are charged with the care of taxpayers' dollars, we need to lead by example," Rep. Candice Miller, R-Mich., who chairs the House Administration Committee, said last week in promoting a bill to slash the budgets of House committees by 11 percent.

Earlier in March — after Congress and the White House failed to come up with an alternative to across-the-board cuts in most federal programs — the House imposed an 8.2 percent reduction in lawmakers' personal office budgets. That came on top of 11 percent cuts to members' office budgets during 2011-2012.

"We've drastically reduced travel both for myself and my staff," said Republican Rep. John Campbell, who must cross the country to visit his southern California district. He said he tends to stay in Washington on two-day weekends rather than return home. "I'm more productive here when I'm not rushing to get home," he added.

Campbell said other "little things" he is doing to economize include reducing the office phone bill, cutting off magazine and newspaper subscriptions, and using email rather than letters to communicate with voters.

Rep. Luke Messer, a freshman Republican from Indiana, said he hired fewer people when he came to Washington because "we essentially began the term knowing there was a high possibility of a sequester"— Washington-speak for the automatic spending cuts.

So far, congressional staffers appear to have escaped the furloughs that are likely to send thousands of public servants home without pay for several workdays over the next six months and disrupt some government services. "I hope to avoid that," said Rep Jared Polis, D-Colo., "but we will take any steps to ensure we don't exceed our budget." Under House rules, a lawmaker must pay for excess spending out of his or her own pocket.

The fiscal pressures are less strong in the Senate, where senators have staff budgets about double the amount of the $1.3 million average in the House and where the office cuts ordered because of the sequester were limited to 5 percent.

While staffers still have their jobs, they may have a harder time getting to them. Security officials have cut costs by closing 10 entrances and several side streets around the Capitol complex, creating long lines to get through screening stations. People "have started to adjust to those changes at the entrances," although it is still a challenge on busy days, said U.S. Senate Sergeant at Arms Terrance Gainer.

Gainer, who oversees nearly 1,000 security and administrative employees, said he hopes to abide by the 5 percent sequester cut without layoffs by enlisting 70 or 80 people for a voluntary retirement program.

Some House members also are feeling the pinch during the two-week Easter break, a prime time for foreign "fact-finding" tours. House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, announced last month that members must book commercial flights rather than make use of more convenient but more expensive military aircraft.

Some Democrats have complained the GOP enthusiasm for frugality has come at too high a cost.

"At a time when most members of this body are representing newly formed congressional districts with a need to open new offices or move to new locations, we find ourselves with an 8.2 percent decrease in the very operating budgets that support constituent services," said Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla.

Wasserman Schultz, who also is the Democratic Party's chairwoman, criticized House Republicans for cutting budgets while spending some $3 million for the legal defense of the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act, which bars federal recognition of same-sex marriages.

"We are past the point of cutting what we want, and we are now into cutting what we need — our ability to attract and retain expert staff," said Robert Brady of Pennsylvania, the senior Democrat on the House Administration Committee.

Brad Fitch, president and CEO of the Congressional Management Foundation, a nonprofit organization that works to improve congressional operations, said it's still possible that House members will have to resort to furloughs or layoffs. So far, he said, they have been able to cope with the cuts of the past three years with less-drastic steps, such as reducing the size of their staffs through attrition, making more use of interns and using email rather than mass mailings.

At the end of 2011, Fitch's group recommended 46 possible ways for members to cut $90,000 from their 2012 budgets, ranging from pay freezes, holding more town hall meetings by telephone, delaying purchases of new computers, eliminating Washington staffers' visits to district offices, closing district offices, eliminating bottled water from offices and reviewing spending on food and beverages for constituents.

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